This invention relates to fabric dryers utilizing an elongated oven with an improved conveyor system for controlling fabric shrinkage.
Fabric dryers constructed in accordance with the prior art are exemplified by the disclosure of U.S. Pat. No. 2,597,490, issued May 20, 1952 which is incorporated herein and made a part hereof by reference. Despite this and other efforts to solve the problem of garment shrinkage, such has persisted through the years. In order to prevent fabric shrinkage, the material must be shrunk as at the dryer wherein an attempt is made to restore the yarn or fibers of the fabric to a tensionless state and thereby remove the stretch previously imparted to the yarn or fibers and render the fabric less susceptible or at least partially immune to later shrinkage.
This objective has been met with only limited success with this and other prior art dryers or ranges occurs because of the extreme length of the conveyor necessary to transport the fabric through the oven and maintain the fabric in proper relation to the foraminous woven belt of the dryer while heated air is blown through the fabric. Due to the length of the endless conveyor, it is extremely difficult to control and to provide uniform tension to the fabric during its passage through the range. Because of the resulting lack of a uniform tensionless condition in the fabric during such transport, shrinkage is inhibited in a non uniform fashion causing uneven shrinkage characteristics to persist in the treated fabric.
Efforts to solve the problem have included the Continuous Drying Machine, Model P92/T, supplied by Essico of Milan, Italy. Such machines embody alternating blowing and sucking flows of heated air through the fabric along its path on the endless conveyor. Other prior art U.S. Patents of general interest include U.S. Pat. Nos. 518,332, 3,097,413 and 3,185,286.
Accordingly, it is an important object of this invention to provide a fabric dryer affording a more nearly uniform tensionless state to the fabric as it passes through the dryer.
Another important object is to provide shrink resistant fabric wherein any remaining tendency to shrink will be more nearly uniform.
An important object of the invention is the provision of a dryer and method wherein a number of conveyors are provided to maintain control over the tension in the fabric in such a way as to create a more nearly tensionless condition.